The fuel bill went in just one direction and that was upward. With a fleet of some ten ships in the Mediterranean, Louis Cruise Lines decided that something had to be done.
“We decided that something had to be done to reduce the fuel bill while at the same time increasing our focus on reducing the environmental impact of our operations,” says Chrysanthos Chrysanthou, Technical Superintendent for Core Marine Ltd in Piraeus, Greece, managers of the Louis Cruise Lines ships, the fifth largest cruise operator in the world transporting 280,000 passengers in 2009.
“The first phase,” says Mr Chrysanthou, “was to identify the savings potential. We hired consultants from DNV Petroleum Services to deliver what is labelled Total Fuel Management.”
One of the DNV consultants is Thenia Zournatzidou and she explains the focus areas: “What we examined was much more than just the fuel and bunkering operations of Louis Cruise Lines. Itinerary optimisation, engine utilisation, maintenance and lay up, energy consumers, bunkering procedure and finally awareness and training were also covered.”
The DNV project has taken a bit more than half a year. “Our relation with DNV is very good and we get information and assistance when we ask for it,” says Mr Chrysanthou.
Competition between ships
“It has become a form of competition between our ships, to perform well. We have had in-house training and awareness building and this has no less than changed our company culture,” he says, adding that the impact in financial and environmental terms are quite impressive. “Training has been a key success factor. We have been giving our crew the reasons why it is so important to reduce fuel consumption. The training has been done on all ships and the fleet’s actual consumption has been reduced by about 9,000 MT between 2009 and 2008 including residual and distillate fuels.
“Energy and ventilation consume about one third of the fuel, the hotel takes the other third and propulsion stands for the remaining third. One energy consumer is water and the total reduction here has been about 9%. Also the garbage expenses have been reduced by some 35% in terms of m3.”
Information leaflet
“We have produced a small leaflet that we hand out to our passengers and the environmental profile has been very successful. The passengers have been very good at turning off lights and not using more resources than needed.
“We must not forget the bunkering part,” says Mr Chrysanthou. “We found that often the bunkers we received were not up to the industry standard. And this is where the expertise of DNV Petroleum Services is especially relevant. With five laboratories worldwide dedicated to fuel quality analysis, DNV has a 65% market share in this field. The advantage to customers, like Louis Cruise Lines, is that DNV can provide fuel data worldwide, and this is often used to ensure the right quality and also to recover funds from the suppliers where standards are not met.
“Out of the 300 samples we took in 2008, 50% were below standard when it comes to certain parameters. This figure was reduced to only 10% in 2009. The suppliers now know that we monitor the supplies closely. We have discussed with our suppliers and defined trigger levels for quality. We had many quality issues in the past, including a shortage of 300 tonnes when comparing fuel bills to what was actually delivered. In 2008 we received credit notes from the suppliers for more than 100,000 US$. Last year this was reduced to 20,000 US$ just by doing the job right in the first place,” says Mr Chrysanthou.
Mentality change
“The DNV Total Fuel Management approach has really changed the mentality of the company and of the crew. This is a continuous process and we feel that as a company, we have taken a huge step in the right direction of reducing our environmental impact. This has to do with the sustainability of the company and that we can comply with ever tougher emission regulations. We have become much more efficient, the publicity and public perception of our actions are good, and the payback time for the investments in time, training and hardware solutions is short.”